Thursday, August 03, 2006

I guess I know MY place in the pecking order!

So. After not-so-subtle hints to my DEAR husband that the kids should go to bed early tonight "wink wink, nudge nudge," he puts on a movie in the family room so they can do a "movie night" together.

Um. OKAY???

Apparently, sleeping on the floor and being kicked in the head by our sons is more exciting than me in our bedroom...

Just bitching a bit to relieve the anger.

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Oh. And HERE'S a thought that my husband wouldn't want to read right now: Even though I KNOW we don't have the money, and even though I KNOW I am no where near the perfect mom, and even though I HATE some parts of pregnancy (really hate. ouchy ouchy bad stuff.), I have this feeling that we are still not "done." You know? I mean, we MIGHT be done. We probably ARE done. Patrick would have a heart attack if he even KNEW I was typing this, let alone thinking it.

BUT.

But, I'm not sure that our family is complete... I have the blessing of being able to make that choice (and I know that some of my fellow bloggers do not have as easy of a choice).

I remember, about 2 years ago, we were at the zoo. The boys were sitting on the floor, playing with the plastic bugs at the children's zoo, and I said to Patrick,

"I look at them, and I feel like someone's missing."

Well, that same night, I got sick. I mean I got REALLY sick. Puking all night. The shakes, intense pain in my stomach. And the pains and vomitting continued the next day. Though, I had an empty stomach. I had had chili at the zoo (really really good chili, which, alas, I will never ever eat from there again).

Finally, in desperation, I called my mother-in-law, as she was home, to come and take me to the Emergency room. It was THAT bad (if you knew me, you'd know that I rarely go to the doctor and almost NEVER take medications).

We get to the ER. I am still in serious pain. After several questionaires, several doctors looking at me and saying "Um, food poisoning? I guess?" the gynecologist from my group came in and said that they were going to do a cat scan just to rule anything out.

Well, a scary 15 minutes later (and ewwww, that feels weird) and they were done.

Come to find out, I had a very large tumor on my ovary. A "dermoid cyst" to be technical. Long story short, I had to have surgery that week to remove it.

Now, some people may think that a cyst is no big deal. Well. I have a foot long scar on my stomach which they had to carefully remove the cantelope sized tumor from my left ovary (and a ping pong ball sized one from my right, just for kicks). Add to that, the fact that I didn't heal properly (the incision didn't close. I had to clean the 3 inch wide, 2 inch deep wound BY MYSELF 3 times a day and had to have someone drive me into the doctor's office every other day to have it inspected for infection. It finally healed 2 weeks later. OH MY GOD is all I can say.) And I can remember getting absolutely hysterical as they were wheeling me down to the operating room. Tears pouring down, shaking, with my arms strapped down.

As Patrick was driving me to the hospital, pre-surgery, I was crying. I was sure that there would be additional problems: it would be cancer. it would be so severe that they would destroy or have to remove my ovary(s). the anesthesiologist would screw up and I would die. (I actually wrote letters to my boys and husband... lots of fun). You get the picture.

I begged him, that if all went ok, that we would have our third child. (I know, I know. Subversive tactics...)

Well. I survived. I healed (physically. Obviously still have some emotional scarring...) And I held him to the third baby deal. Which he agrees is the best decision we've ever made. I mean how could you not love THIS FACE?!?

So, do I bring it up to him? I don't want another right now. Good GOD no! Shudders... BUT... I don't want to rule out the possibility. You know? I hate that everyone just assumes that we're done. And I try to combat it with "Well, unless we get surprised... " and "It wouldn't be the WORST thing to happen..."

Sigh. I know. There are people with MUCH bigger worries in their worlds. Mine is very small. I am actually not so worked up over the issue of a fourth child. But I think what I truly needed was to document some of my issues over the surgery. It kind of fell by the wayside. I DID talk about it, but not everyone was as interested as I needed, you know? But YOU! Well, you're my captive audience!! And if you've skimmed or stopped reading or WHATEVER, well, I won't be the wiser. I thank anyone who has made it so far.

Me and my youngest milkshake lover

About Me

I am also known as Justanothermom on Twitter and write on my blog, Just Another Mommy Blog. I homeschool 3 kids in the suburbs outside of Chicago and am a Co-Producer of Listen To Your Mother in Chicago.